Friday 7th December 2018

Back home now for 5 days after four days in denmark and a couple of days in Norwich before that. A similar busy period coming up next weekend too, so I need to make the most of these days spent at home, even if I do have to work.

But waking up in your own bed, a cat beside you with Jools making coffee downstairs, is just perfect.

But it is dark outside, and stays dark until well after seven, by which time Jools had left for work with the rain hammering down from the dark skies. And daylight, or what passed for it, brough just more heavy rain. It looked grim out there, so I turned the heating up another notch so I could stay warm. It remained so dark with clouds that I needed the table lamp all day, just to be able to see to type or write.

Mulder, instead of settling down for a day snoozing, is running around like a mad thing, jumping through the catflap, running into the living room to the back of the sofa, and then back out again. He does this at least three times, and he looked spooked as anything, but it could just be him having what my Dad would call a "mad five minutes". Describes Mulder quite well

I have the radio on, a documentary on the history of pop music, and that reached 1962 and 63. The Beatles really came from nowhere, then exploded in a flurry of self-written classics. How exciting it must have all seemed. But for every Beatles there was a Freddy and the Dreamers.

Outside, the rain continued to hammer down.

Come half two, I am done for the day. And week. So pack away and am just watching a recording of this week's Only Connect when Jools comes home.

It now being December, we decide we can now sample one of the Christmas cakes, so I make a brew too, and cut a generous slice of the Dundee cake. And even the edge was moist. The fruit was perfect, just as well as it had been marinated in cognac for 36 hours back in September.

I cook bangers and mash for dinner, which we eat early, as we have a night of cards with Jen and Sylv planned.

The rain had stopped as we drove to Whitfield, but the traffic was horrible, and then I had to go and pick John up from the bottom of Whitfield Hill, u which was nose to tail traffic waiting to get onto the roundabout.

Once we get back to Jen's we play, chat, laugh and drink. Jools and I do OK, just about end up even, but Sylv scoops the big jackpot, so went from having pennies to over a tenner.

We also make plans for Christmas, as Jools and I are going over, and I am cooking dinner. Which will be interesting, but for now, the day is done, so Jools takes us back home. It is just gone eleven, and we are bushed.